


Unfortunate Circumstances

by NateChal



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-09
Updated: 2019-01-09
Packaged: 2019-10-07 05:39:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17360072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NateChal/pseuds/NateChal
Summary: Being a smuggler can be hard, it's not an easy life and the risks are high. Sometimes life can be lucrative, for those of silver tongue, but sometimes luck just isn't the order of the day. Even the best smuggler, when caught in a planetary assault, can feel the pressures of the universe. Nadska is one such smuggler, but can he escape the clutches of the empire before it's too late?





	1. Chapter 1

Nadska knew he was in trouble. He’d had the misfortune to be planet-side when the first of the Star Destroyers emerged from hyperspace above Kashyyyk, now everyone on the jungle world was trapped. The imperials had already jammed global communications and were commencing a well orchestrated assault on the planetary defences. That was all Nadska knew, he honestly didn’t care what the Empire wanted with Kashyyyk. He just needed to get away. Any skilled smuggler could outwit an imperial starship, but evading ground forces was a sight harder.

Every so often he heard remote shots of canon fire, though it was difficult to pinpoint the origin. The acoustics of the forest convoluted his perception of sound.

He stooped into an abandoned yurt just as a handful of interceptors screamed overhead, thunderous explosions shook the ground beneath him. A great splintering of wood, like a toppling tree, followed the bombardment. Nadska tried to banish the image of innocent wookies plummeting to their doom.

Shots from the standard issue E-11 blaster rifles, carried by all ordinary stormtroopers, cut through the din a battle. By the sound of it he didn’t have much time before they reached him.

Nadska drew his modified verpine pistol and held a concussion grenade in the opposite hand, just in case. Through the yurt’s open entrance he saw a group of wookies mercilessly cut down by a portable turret. At least he assumed it was a turret. His visibility farther up the beach was obstructed by the yurts flap, but the rapid-fire incendiary bolts suggested a gun much stronger than a rifle.

Nadska sank into the shadows as a contingent of stormtroopers crossed his field of vision. Their stark white armour gleamed in the sunlight. Following the troopers was an entirely different figure, tall and as black as night, with a billowing cape and –Nadska couldn’t believe his eyes– a lightsabre. He’d only ever heard about the legendary weapons of the force users, never had he actually seen one.

“Vader…” he breathed. This apparition of evil could only be the dark lord himself.

He watched the notorious sith ignite his weapon; a blood-red blade sprang to life to meet the furious charge of two wookies, a black furred male with dappled colouring and a sandy brown female. Both roared furiously at their antagonist and brandished primitive weapons.

A wave of the dark lord’s hand sent the sandy brown female soaring backward. The enormous male barrelled into Vader with the force of a transport shuttle and swung his cudgel. The sith slashed at the weapon with his lightsabre, severing it. The wookie tried to jump back but wasn’t quick enough to escape the murderous red blade.

Nadska waited until Darth Vader and his troopers were out of sight before dashing from his shelter toward the cover of some shoreline debris. His ship, The Silverfish, a customized service shuttle, was sitting on a waterborne landing pad not far from his position. Not a minute went by that Nadska wasn’t cursing his luck for not deciding to have left an hour or two earlier; or not stopping on Kashyyyk at all and heading straight for Dantooine instead. Life as a smuggler was a relatively easy life for those who new the tricks of the trade. The most difficult aspect was being at the right place at the right time, Nadska generally steered clear of imperial occupied regions of space. It was just his luck that he found himself in the middle of a planetary assault.

Several more TIE fighters and a sentinel-class landing craft flew by overhead, the whine of its ion engines blotted out the sounds of distant battle. A squad of jet troopers hopped off the transport as it passed, activating their power-packs in mid flight and shooting off into the woods. The efflux trails left by their jets looked like shimmering blue strands of a web.

Nadska remained concealed until they passed and sprinted across the open expanse of beach toward the docking pier, and his salvation. He might have made it too, if not for the flash-bang grenade that went off beside him.

Then all hell broke loose.


	2. Unfortunate Circumstances

Nadska's sight returned to him in fragments of light. He was lying on his back in the sand, a skirmish between the wookies and imperial troopers had erupted around him. Bowcaster bolts and hot red lasers littered the air above the beach.

The Silverfish was still waiting for him, yet untouched by the ferocity of the exchange. Without concerning himself of his surroundings he resumed his mad dash for freedom.

Only when his boots touched the pier did he allow himself a glimmer of hope. The stormtroopers along the shoreline took cursory shots at him, fortunately most of them didn't even come close to hitting their mark. Nadska was both a small target and not their primary concern.

The mechanical scream of a TIE fighter descending from the forest's upper canopy cut through the mêlée. He looked around and saw it emerge from behind a great wroshyr tree. The TIE scorched the beach with its forward guns and then angled towards him.

"No," he breathed. Too late, and while Nadska himself may not have been enticing bait for the pilot, the Silverfish was.

The pot-shot missed the landing pad by a hairsbreadth, but the impact was still enough so that the resulting shockwave sent him flying through the air and splashing into the water.

Nadska sputtered to the surface and swore; the TIE vanished into the distance. His ship was untouched, thankfully, but the pier leading to it was damaged, and clamouring onto the landing pad wouldn't be possible. He'd have to find another way to reach it.

Another intense tremor shook the beach, he glanced up toward the sky and saw the triangular shape of a victory-class star destroyer descending into the lower atmosphere. Despite the distance the sheer immensity of the warship was staggering. At this range the drone of its massive engines sent vibrations through the planet for kilometres, shaking the very soil beneath his feet.

More imperial fighters began to pour from the destroyer's launching bays, from Nadska's point of view they seemed like little black specks next to the looming behemoth.

An errant explosion went off close enough to splash him, he instinctively ducked, "Whole damn planet's going to hell," he muttered.

Some of the combatants on the shore were making quick glances up to the sky. Nadska realized that there were dogfights taking place high above them. He watched as a republic fighter weaved and spun through a handful of bombers, shooting from their flanks and transforming them into balls of flame.

Wait, a republic fighter?

Above even the dogfights there was a rebel flagship visible between the clouds, launching fighters of its own. Nadska had no affiliation with the republic, nor did he want to, but if they felt like liberating Kashyyyk then who was he to interfere.

The destroyer was mere kilometres away from the beach now and closing. TIE fighters, bombers, and interceptors were still shooting out of the monsters belly.

Suddenly a massive beam of concentrated energy shot up from somewhere in the jungle and struck the destroyer in one of the rear engines. The ship was engulfed in static electricity. At first nothing happened, then the destroyers nose began to dip toward the ground. A series of explosions were audible from within, after which smoke streamed from the command bridge and several other locations on the vessel. Nadska would have normally revelled in the destruction of an imperial ship, especially a star destroyer, but as he followed the trajectory of the ship he couldn't help but feel a growing sensation of dread.

It was plunging toward the beach.


	3. Unfortunate Circumstances

The realization of his impending death, inescapable and absolute, left him strangely calm. It was only when he felt a presence behind him that he shook himself from his stupor and turned. Before him stood an republic trooper, from the time before the rise of the Galactic Empire. Or at least whoever it was wore the outdated armour of a republic trooper. The armour's appearance suggested that is was the Phase II clone trooper armour used by the republic in the latter half of the clone wars, and the dark coloring identified its bearer as a republic shadow trooper. If so than this man could have killed Nadska on a whim. But he hadn't.

"If you want to live," said the trooper, "I suggest you come with me."

"Where?" he asked incredulously, "Or perhaps you haven't noticed the star destroyer heading straight for us."

The shadow trooper pressed a button on the small control pad built into the plastiod covering his forearm. There was a sound like the hiss of an airlock. Nadska had to blink repeatedly as a BT-7 Thunderclap, a rapid assault ship used in the clone era, materialized behind the him. At the helm of the ship was a stunningly beautiful human woman dressed in a form-fitting flight suit. She looked somewhat bored, despite the war raging outside.

A series of blaster bolts pattered the water around them. The shadow trooper, without so much as turning his head, drew a blaster pistol and shot the offending stormtrooper in the chest.

"Last chance smuggler, get in or take your chances on the beach."

Nadska glanced up at the wounded destroyer. The warship had grown considerably larger, blotting out the airborne battle above. "Lead on," he said.

The shadow trooper turned and bolted up the ship's ramp with Nadska close on his heels. The inside of the ship was neat and clean, albeit old. Nadska suspected that most of their equipment, including the ship and the shadow troopers armour, had been salvaged over time.

Nadska took a seat behind the woman piloting the Thunderclap while the trooper seated himself in the co-pilots chair. The woman briefly looked over her shoulder to assess him with brilliant green eyes before turning back to the task at hand. Her long black hair was streaked with red, and was tied into a braid that fell over her shoulder and down to her shapely hip. Nadska safely assumed that her companion was also human, or at least near-human.

"All systems check out sir," she said. "Awaiting your command."

More of the remaining stormtroopers dotting the beach were firing at them now. A pointless gesture of hostility. The red hot blaster bolts were deflected by the Thunderclap's shields and bounced harmlessly into the water or towards the beach. The star destroyer was so close now that it was whipping up powerful gusts as it fell.

The Thunderclap flared to life. Nadska grunted when the ship lifted out of the water and bucked violently.

"Engage the stabilizers and activate the cloaking systems," said the shadow trooper.

"Already done," the woman replied steadily.

She flipped a few switches on the ship's control board and eased forward. For a second Nadska thought there might be something wrong with the ship, then he was thrown back in his seat as the Thunderclap lurched forward.

"She's old, smuggler. But you'd be hard pressed to find a more reliable ship."

The woman smirked.

Behind them the destroyer's nose touched down on the beach, obliterating the shore and snapping wroshyr trees like they were matchsticks. Nadska didn't get to see what happened next. The Thunderclap sped up through the clouds and into the upper atmosphere, leaving Kashyyyk far behind.


End file.
